![]() ![]() The alternative is deceiving yourself with ideology and nihilism. The hero's journey justifies the burden of being by pursuing truth, making order out of chaos. "Crumb"is a film that gives new meaning to the notion of art as therapy.Jordan Peterson's goal is to strengthen the individual. Yet as I left the film, I felt that if anyone had earned the rightto express his own vision, it was Crumb, since his art is so clearly a copingmechanism that has allowed him to survive, and deal with his pain. And he interviews suchvoices of sanity as Deirdre English, former editor of Mother Jones magazine,who finds his work pornographic - "an arrested juvenile vision." Soit is, and her voice expresses not puritanism, but concern and simpleobservation. Mrs.Crumb, interviewed while sprawled on a sofa and worrying darkly about thewindow shades, seems complacent about the fact that Charles never leaves thehouse: "At least he's not out taking illegal drugs or making some womanmiserable." Zwigoff shows us details of many Crumb comic strips that areintensely violent, sadistic and hateful toward women. In a visit to the family home, occupied by Charles andhis mother, we visit the upstairs room that he rarely left, and with Robertessentially acting as the interviewer, he remembers, "I was good-looking,but there was something wrong with my personality I was the most unpopular kidin school." On a visit to Max, the youngest brother, we find him living asa monk, drawing a long linen tape through his body to clean his intestines, andshowing recent oil paintings of considerable skill (he still has his mail-ordertest from the Famous Artists School). IfRobert was unhappy in high school, Charles found it an ordeal from which henever really recovered. Hepages through the faces in a high school yearbook, and then we see theirlook-alikes in his cartoons. ![]() Itis surprising to learn how closely autobiographical some of his drawings are in his comics, men are fixated by callipygian women and dream of riding thempiggyback, and then we see Robert doing the same thing at a gallery opening. Hewas intensely unhappy in high school, nursed deep grudges against hiscontemporaries and uses high school enemies as the models for many of theunattractive caricatures in his work. ![]() We learn most, however, from Robert himself. Manyof the people in Crumb's life talk with great frankness about him, includinghis brothers, his mother, his first wife, Dana (who says he began to develop a"new vision" in 1966 after experimenting with drugs), and his presentwife, Aline Kominsky, who recounts bizarre details of his lifestyle withacceptance and understanding. And while it is one thing to learnthat Robert masturbated while looking at comics, especially his own, it isanother to learn that his prime erotic fixation was with Bugs Bunny. The brothersseem to have had strong fantasy relationships with comic characters Charlesbegan to pretend he was Long John Silver. It was Charles, the oldest, who firststarted to draw comic strips, and then Robert began to copy him. (There were also two sisters, who declined toparticipate in the film.) All three brothers retreated into fantasies in anattempt to cope with their home life. It is about the artist, who grew upin a dysfunctional family led by a father who was an overbearing tyrant - adepressive, sadistic bully who, according to this film, beat his sons and lostfew opportunities to demean them. No less an authority than Robert Hughes, theart critic of Time magazine, appears in "Crumb" to declare him"the Brueghel of the last half of the 20th century." But"Crumb" is not really about the art, although it will cause you tolook at his familiar images with a new eye. His new work is shown in galleriesand is in important collections. Hisoriginal illustrations and the first editions of his 1960s and 1970sunderground comic books command high prices. OfCrumb's importance and reputation, there is not much doubt. "Crumb" was directed by TerryZwigoff, who had two advantages: He had known Crumb well for years, and Zwigoffwas himself so unhappy and suicidal during the making of the film that in asense Crumb let him do it as a favor. Movieslike this do not usually get made because the people who have lives like thisusually are not willing to reveal them. It is the kind of film that you watch in disbelief, as layer afterlayer is peeled away, and you begin to understand the strategies that have keptCrumb alive and made him successful while one of his brothers became a reclusein an upstairs bedroom and the other passes his time literally sitting on a bedof nails. "Crumb,"which is one of the most remarkable and haunting documentaries ever made, tellsthe story of Robert Crumb, his brothers Max and Charles, and an Americanchildhood that looks normal in old family photographs but conceals deep woundsand secrets. ![]()
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